“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(As we sat for the session Jane gave me a copy [which is attached] of the dreams she had while taking a nap this afternoon. “I think I have the interpretations of them,” she said, “but maybe Seth will talk about them too. In fact, I just got the last part of the second dream as I was sitting here....”

(She was again very relaxed today. She’d also been picking up from Seth through the day some quite amused comments on a variety of subjects we’d mentioned, ranging from “carpets and health” to the “nature of the law, the connection between the law and ideals and their actualization; the reactions of Tam Mossman to our feelings about Fate Magazine,” etc.

(Last Thursday night our guest was John Beahrs, a psychiatrist from the Seattle, Washington area. Now I’m in the process of writing a long letter to Larry Dowler, of the Yale University Library, and this activity showed up also in Seth’s bleedthroughs and comments.)

In the matter of publishing, or selling paintings, others are involved—others who very rarely in their lives experience that important encounter between, say, the self as actualized and the idealized sensed self, between the painting or the poem as an ideal and the actualization of that ideal. You cannot give such people a general impression of what you want. If you are concerned with such matters as covers that do not live up to your ideals of what covers should be, then you must begin your definitions. Ruburt has primarily been concerned with the ideal that is behind all of his books, and with the practical matter of getting those out into the world. (Pause.) He was willing to put up with a good deal to do so, to overlook lacks of taste in presentation, say.

On the other hand, of course, the very individuality implied in art itself tells you that even the ideal must follow its own eccentric patterns, and that man must find his own way out of his l-a-c-k-s (spelled). Ruburt, however, would rarely deal with such issues at all, though he was aware of them, so you felt you bore the brunt. You cannot expect Prentice to understand the nature of your own idealism, or Ruburt’s, in such a way that Prentice as an entity can apply that idealism to its packaging. Not unless you define, you specify. You get together, the two of you, on each issue, as it happens, and make your decision together, and stick by it. You have not done this before because each of you would become irritated at the other’s mode of behavior.

Ruburt felt that your idealism could threaten the practical distribution of the books, so that his idealistic purpose—to get those words out—could be held back. You felt that the lack of taste, and often of artistic integrity, was so blatant that it blighted the words themselves, marred the message. Both of you were concerned with the ideal. You felt Ruburt was being too “practical,” and would put up with almost anything, and he felt that you were being too impractical at times.

Because neither of you really (underlined) defined and carried through on your definitions some black or white thinking resulted. It would seem to you that all of the books were marred, in that manner, now, or it would seem to Ruburt that nothing was wrong at all, in that manner. You would find it hard to express pleasure with a given cover, or you would forget, as with Seven Two, for its attributes would seem lost in your larger displeasure. Or Ruburt, feeling displeasure with Prentice on any occasion, would find it difficult to admit to you.

Dream one is in answer to Ruburt’s wondering whether or not it was a good idea to make out a will now, rather than to wait until a later date.

The coins represent the small amount of money Ruburt did receive. The old man also stands for Ruburt’s father, as Ruburt thought of him bumming around, frittering away his time and energy, so he was stealing from the pot. There would be nothing left. Ruburt was not greedy, but curious. The missing key represented Yale locks (with emphatic amusement). The dream said “Do not wait too late to set up the legal mechanism,” and affirmed that Yale was at least a good idea. (Pause.) The old man also stood for old man time in the dream, and reinstated the fact that an executor is important, for the old man also stood for —in the dream, now—Ruburt’s father acting as his own executor—meaning that his nature led him to leave ends loose.

Pat was chosen symbolically, yet stands for a definite situation, when you two visited Boston on tour. At that time, Ruburt saw Pat, who is a teacher, and was traveling through belief systems with the greatest of ease, converting to Judaism and then out of it, and so forth. I spoke on television, and you were both appalled at the gulf between what you saw as the idealized message of our work, and the ludicrous (pause) lack of integrity of the environment in which that ideal was expressed. I am referring to the other performer, et cetera—the circumstances which you know well.

To do so, however, they must back down through previous limiting beliefs, and had you not wakened Ruburt, the four of you would have joined each other on the stage. Ruburt was correct in what he picked up from me today (half laughing)—concerning both your rugs and nationalized medicine, and some of its effects upon the poor if it were established.

(10:28 PM. Jane’s delivery had been good throughout the session, and once again she was relaxed now that it was over. Seth’s reference to the poor and nationalized health care referred to material Jane had picked up from him during the day; The poor were actually better off as they are now, without such a national health-care plan, for as it is they’re isolated from and immune to a number of ills they would start falling prey to if they could afford to pay for such treatment—that is, if the costs were paid for them. An interesting point of view.)